The Play Turned Tragic
by walked-into-the-sky
Summary: It's not a love story, but at least it's honest. Slash of the SBRL variety, among others. Rating to change in the future.
1. Prologue

A/N: So, I am having this Harry Potter movie marathon with myself, right? And I'm watching the Prisoner of Azkaban, wishing Remus was real so I could marry him (just kidding. Or am I?) and then Sirius popped in all dog like and I thought to myself, "I want to write a Sirius/Remus epic. Like, now and stuff." Seriously, that was the exact thought. And so. I am. I know, I have a ton of other stories in the works and I'm a nasty, nasty girl for just creating more and more fanfiction work for myself. Whatever. It's summer. And I'm bored as fuck.

So, this is The Unconventional Lady going against everything that my story, "The Art of Taming" stands for (Yeah, it's a LupinTonks thing. Yeah, I ship both. Yeah, I know, I'm strange.) and telling a love story that totally ignores the existence of Nymphadora Tonks. I've got plans for her though (and they don't involve death or anything. I've got another sexy wizard lined up for her. Well, in my head he's sort of sexy. In an old-ish, awesome way. And no, you pervs, it's not Dumbledore. Yeah, I know how your minds work.)

HERE ARE SOME WARNINGS THAT YOU MIGHT WANT TO CONSIDER THAT WILL, I REPEAT THAT, WILL APPLY IN THE FUTURE OF THIS STORY: There will be Slash, lots and lots of slash. And some violence. And some NCS…sort of, courtesy of (coughhackitmayormaynotstartwithansanditmayormaynothappentosomeonewhostartswithanr) you will see. And angst. Loads of angst. And my pathetic attempts at comedy. Among other things that have yet to be determined. Yeah. I just wanted to make sure that this was the type of story you'd want to read. And there you have it. The warnings. (applause)

OH! And, post-Ootp time frame there is going to be a little AU. Or a lot. Depending on how you look at it. Yeah. And stuff.

One more thing. I do not own Harry Potter. Nor do I own the Sylvia Plath poem "Converstations Among the Ruins", from which the title was plucked. (I friggin love that word).

So, here we go.

Prologue

Picture this, ladies and gentlemen. An old man telling a strange and tragic and romantic and all around larger than life sort of story to two boys. One is the son of a war hero, the most famous wizard alive. The other is the son of the hero's former rival. Strangely, yet not entirely unexpectedly, they are good friends. Best friends. And, as the old man can see in the way their almost sixteen year old bodies interact, they want to be more. But they are young and foolish and they think they're going to live forever and don't realize that they _don't_ have all the time in the world. And he fears for them. And their happiness. And their innocence.

They ask for a story about war. The old man thinks and realizes this scenario, sort of, has played out before. In different context, though, and under vastly different circumstances. But still, the bones of the tale are the same.

And so he tells them this story, to warn them, and to prompt them into action.

_**When I was your father's age, I knew these two people. They were a little younger than me in body, but much older in spirit, as they had seen more, done more, suffered more than I had at the time. And they showed me what sacrifice was, not through words, but through who they had once been, and who they had become.**_

_**Kids, this isn't a love story, but I've already warned you of that. Sure, they were in love, but it wasn't romantic, or sweet, or even remotely nice, especially around the time I knew them. There was bitterness and anger and sadness and lust and borderline hatred dancing between them when they weren't looking at each other like they wanted to die.**_

_**You said you wanted a story about war. This is the perfect one for you.**_

_**Their names were Padfoot and Moony.**_

_**And this is how it happened.**_

A/N: So, I just realized right now, upon the prologue's completion because I'm just that smart, that there are sort of two stories going on. One, being obvious, is the Sirius/Remus-ness that I wanted when I went to my laptop twenty one minutes ago and began to type. The other, surprisingly, is Albus (Severus) Potter/Scorpius Malfoy. I surprised myself with that one. I know, I clearly have no control over my train of thought or writing. And really, I'm sort of okay with that. Because it provides all sorts of new juiciness for my idea. Yesssssss.

Anyways, if you guys think that…it's good and stuff…or at least a good idea…then, um review. Thanks.


	2. The Chocolate Frog Incident

Did you see that madness in the Half Blood Prince? God, Snape was so sexy. I flippin love him. By the way, I don't own Harry Potter.

Chapter One: The Chocolate Frog Incident

_**Moony and Padfoot did not meet right away when they first arrived at Hogwarts. In fact, it was two weeks before they even acknowledged each other, despite the fact that they shared a dormitory. Moony has called it the "bracing period" and Padfoot has called it the "stupid period", which I suppose, to them, both work. Of course, when they did first meet, it was an instant friendship. Sort of.**_

When Sirius Black, Gryffindor first year and shame of the Ancient and Most Noble Black family, woke up on the Wednesday of his second week of classes, to say that he merely had a headache would have been the understatement of the century. The proper term for what he was feeling would be hippogriff. Meaning, there was obviously a hippogriff pounding incessantly on the back of his left eye. Probably after having been insulted or something, too, because it seemed summarily pissed off at him. That was the only explanation for the excruciating pain he was in. He really needed to watch what he said about that particular species of beast.

He groaned, threw his pillow up over his face, and pressed the soft mass down onto his eyes, trying to persuade the raging hippogriff that he was sorry and he would never do it again with thoughts like, "Those animals are so pretty," and, "A horse and an eagle. The perfect combination." Of course, this did nothing to pacify his attacker. If anything, the effort of thinking these thoughts so hard made his head hurt all the more. He punched at the headboard of his four poster in frustration.

"Sirius?" He thought it was James, but the distortion the violent beating of his eye was causing made his voice sound lower and softer and…well, _girlier_, but he would never tell his friend that. He mumbled out a string of what he knew probably wasn't English in response and managed to roll over, reaching out to clutch at the front of James' robes and beg for some form of cold liquid to dose his pounding head.

"Er…" his hands wrapped themselves in soft fabric that decidedly wasn't school robes and James's voice was suddenly not James's voice. And apparently his headache hadn't caused a distortion at all.

Sirius slowly lifted his head, his black hair falling into his eyes, and found himself face to face with the quiet boy who lived on the edge of their dorm whose name he wasn't quite sure of. He stared into that golden gaze for a moment, struck dumb by the fact that he was gripping what appeared to be the bottom of the boy's ratty pajama shirt and probably looking a bit like a fool, before he regained awareness of himself and the raging hippogriff in his head. He jerked his hand away from its uncomfortably close position to Lupin's, well, for lack of a better word, _crotch _and sat upright, staring at the boy who had awoken him awkwardly, trying not to let his agony, only increased by the movement, show on his face.

"Are you…alright?" he-Remus Lupin,_ that_ was his name-asked slowly, still looking slightly caught off guard by Sirius's reaction to his inquiry, "I…er…heard you moaning in your sleep."

"Moaning?" Well, that was just great. Not only had he almost sexually assaulted the poor boy, but he had appeared weak and pathetic just moments before it. Sirius wondered vaguely if Lupin was a gossip. Then he wondered what percentage of the school would be under the impression that he was a poof by lunch if he was. That would be sure to please his already disgusted parents.

Lupin stared at him, his gaze disconcertingly huge, "Yes…you look pale, too. Are you sick?"

The raging hippogriff must have decided that it would be a good idea to bite his optic nerves. The vision in his left eye was starting to become blotchy. Nevertheless. This was already awkward and embarrassing enough.

"Headache," Sirius grunted and swung his legs off his bed, on the side Lupin wasn't standing beside, to get to his feet. The second he was standing, a wave of vertigo swept over him and he was forced to his knees. Lupin must have leapt over his bed or something, because he was at his side in less than a second.

"It seems like more than a headache to me," he sounded less nervous and shy and more motherly and concerned than before. Sirius didn't protest when Lupin grabbed his wrist and threw one of his arms over his thin shoulders to him to his feet, "I'm going to take you to the hospital wing."

"No, I'm fine," Sirius would have wrenched away if he hadn't thought he was in danger of passing out. But still, he had to put up at least some semblance of a tough guy façade if he wanted to keep his slowly building reputation as well, a tough guy intact. Lupin chuckled dryly.

"No, you're not."

Sirius heaved a huge, fake sigh, "Fine. Take me to the hospital wing, then."

He could have sworn, when Lupin slipped an arm around his waist, that he smirked in challenge to Sirius's bad boy behavior, "I will," he said neutrally, before bearing him down out the dormitory doors, down the stairs, and across the common room.

--

James stopped by after first period, grumbling about the fact that Sirius should have at least let him know that he was sick or something that morning instead of leaving him hanging in "bloody transfiguration, McGonagall reckons you skipped, you know." Sirius merely shrugged, trying not to move too much as the mysterious bout Madame Pomfrey had called a migraine was still controlling him and the potion he had taken when Lupin had dropped him off still had another half an hour before it would take effect. The nurses shooed James out five minutes later, warning that Sirius needed to rest in order for the restorative potion to have a full effect.

--

It wasn't until the end of the day that Madame Pomfrey finally let him go and he wandered back to his dorms, not bothering to stop by the various teachers whose classes he'd missed to explain. He made his way to Gryffindor tower, bit out the password, and hobbled across the common room after catching James's eyes and nodding that he was alright, intent on going to bed. When he reached the dormitory, he entered to find Lupin sitting on his bed, a thick book resting on his folded legs. The slighter boy looked up when Sirius shut the door behind him and smiled.

"Feeling better?"

Sirius nodded and slouched across the room to his bed, flopping down on his stomach and burying his face in his pillow. After he lay there in perpetual, painless bliss for about five minutes, something struck his back and he rolled over, knocking the object to the ground. He leaned over the edge of his mattress and found a chocolate frog sitting innocently on the ground. He cast Lupin a curious look over his shoulder and found him smiling weakly.

Sirius returned the gesture before grabbing the frog, unwrapping it, and shoving it in his mouth before it could even so much as make a bid for freedom.

_**Thus began the friendship between Padfoot and Moony. **_

Scorpius Malfoy frowned and exchanged a look with his best friend. Albus leaned back on the sofa the pair was sharing, his eyes on the old man, "That's it?" he asked, sounding slightly disappointed.

The story teller lifted an eyebrow, "What do you mean, that's it?"

Scorpius scowled, "It was hardly dramatic. You made it out to seem like everything was intense," Albus shot him a strange sort of glance, something the blonde boy seemed unaware of, but the old man took careful note of.

"They were eleven."

"Mr. Weasley," Albus said, as though speaking to a child, "When we met, I punched Scorpius in the face."

Arthur Weasley's lips twitched.

"Yes, but Remus is hardly the dramatic type."

Scorpius wrinkled his nose, "Fine. So, I'm assuming they got all love sick and foolish then?"

Another look flew from Albus's eyes to the side of Scorpius's head. Arthur smiled, "Come now, you didn't think it'd be that easy, did you?"

Both boys stared up at him, the eagerness rapidly returning to their expressions.

_**Moony had a secret.**_


End file.
